


What I Wish I'd Known

by mnemosyne



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Alternate Universe - Space, F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-20
Updated: 2015-12-20
Packaged: 2018-05-07 20:18:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 5,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5469611
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mnemosyne/pseuds/mnemosyne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Space AU. A collection of moments in the life of Alexander Hamilton, blogger, soldier and future leader of the new colonies on Mars. Otherwise entitled "In which everyone can't help but love Alexander, at least a little".</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Tomorrow - Prologue

**Author's Note:**

  * For [myrifique](https://archiveofourown.org/users/myrifique/gifts).



> The AU part of this drifted away somewhat, and it's turned rather more shippy than anything else. All rather G-rated and implied, but I stand by my tags.

_From a distance, he looks like any other one of the elderly men on the planet; there are not so many these days. Mars is not yet a place to grow old in comfort. His movements belie stiff joints as he kneels in the red earth, and his hair, grey-white, falls in wisps to frame a wrinkled, weathered face._

_Move closer, though, and he will look up at footsteps that crunch in the dust. Meet his gaze, and the sharp, glittering eyes of the youth he has not been for decades now will stare back. The way his lip curls, the smile before the smile that has ever been the only half-certain thing he carries with him, has always made him seem younger than his years and even now it works its magic, casts him with a timelessness so that it is impossible to tell if the face he wears is his own, or one from a memory once known and thought forgotten._

_“Alexander.”_

_He looks away again. His fingers splay against a small, dull rock and he presses down, searching for a mark you know he cannot see._

_“Burr,” he says, and his voice too belongs to a younger man; for the pain that scratches at the edges of his vowels, the evidence of the life that is still in him is enough to make anyone’s bones ache. There are dust marks on his trousers when he stands, and the futile scrub of his knuckles against the fabric is so familiar you could laugh. Here, of all places, you know that he would join you in it._

_“With all the celebrations going on this month, I wasn’t going to come,” he says, holding out a hand, “but here I am anyway. I think I’d call myself an old romantic.”_

_“A touch dramatic.”_

_“Are you going to give me something better?”_

_“How about ’relic'?"_

_He does laugh at that, eyes crinkling with delight. “That’s supposed to be less dramatic? You’ll consign me to the history books before I’m done living through them.” The chuckle is lower than it used to be, but throaty, and he glances back down at the rocks. “Let me stay in the anecdotes a while longer.”_

_“I don’t think that will be a problem. There’s a balloon with your face on it flying over Jefferson Gardens as we speak.”_

_“That’s fair,” says Alexander. “I hope it can be seen for miles.” He leans back on a small incline, and indicates to the empty space behind him. “But you, sir. This is the first time I have seen you come all the way back here.”_

_“It is hardly far.”_

_“I’m not sure if it makes my case less valid or more.”_

_“Perhaps I’m getting old and romantic myself.”_

_“Burr-“_

_“I'm leaving.”_

_“What?”_

_“Tomorrow. Perhaps for a year. Perhaps longer.” The words are drier than ash to say out loud; for everything that has happened, for the years that stretch between them, this farewell was never going to be easy. “Another turning point. I merely wanted to pay my respects to the last.”_

_“All these years. I didn’t think you thought anything much of it.”_

_You smile yourself, at the furrow in his brow._

_“Alexander, old friend. Perhaps our tragedy was that we never really understood each other.”_

  
  



	2. Yesterday - '76

The distance between this bar and home is barely imaginable, but the stale smell of alcohol and overcooked food is as familiar here as anywhere. Alexander moves through the crowd, three glasses balanced precariously between his hands; Lafayette trails behind him, offering up a continuous, disparaging commentary that is entirely unhelpful to Alexander's current state. The tray of shots he holds high over his head are barely wavering as he uses the beer bottles in his other hand to widen the path free of elbows.

There's a high flush on Laurens' cheeks when they finally arrive, and Mulligan tousles his hair roughly, before leaning forward to divest Alexander of two of the glasses. Lafayette shrugs at his reproachful look and places the tray on the table in front of them. Burr, next to Laurens, frowns, even as he takes his own drink.

“I see nobody's making any plans for tomorrow morning,” he remarks. Lafayette snorts and pushes two of the shots over to him with his finger tips.

“I am nothing but plans for tomorrow,” he says.

Alexander slides in beside Laurens, arm snaking round the back of his chair, close enough to poke Burr in the shoulder, and closer enough still to wind the offending finger carefully, gently into Laurens' curls.

“You're nobody's grandfather yet, Burr,” he says, genially. “What's a few drinks going to do, really?” He knocks back his own two shots and grins. A small movement of Lafayette's and another two appear in front of him. Alexander picks one up, holds it out to Burr like he's making a toast. “I'm speaking at the meeting in the morning.”

Burr sighs and places both elbows on the table. His head rests on his knuckles as he looks beyond Laurens to Alexander's entirely too bright expression. “There's a part of me that hopes I'm still going to be drunk,” he says, seriously. “Because I'm getting a hangover just looking at you.”

Laurens laughs, and Alexander's arm loosens enough to let him bang his shoulder gently against Burr's. “It will be fine, Burr. Alex could be bleeding out and he'd still have enough spirit in him to stand and talk for hours.”

“I think he talks best when he's got spirits in him,” Mulligan adds. Alexander makes a face, which is blithely and conspicuously ignored.

“As long as you don't start any fights this time.”  
“I can't promise that,” Alexander replies. His fingers tap a drum-beat against the table. “I don't understand the complacency in this place. We're not on company time any more.”

“Or the company's dime,” Mulligan mutters into his glass, casting a glance at Lafayette, who shrugs. “For those of us who ever were.”

“A lot of people still remember what it was like when it all started.” A hand waves out, indicating the rest of the bar, “They haven't even bothered scraping off the Royal branding on the walls, it's just painted over.”

“A lot of people ought to remember better that they're out here for a reason.”

“And what reason would that be?”

“To live again,” says Alexander.

 


	3. Yesterday - '80

When he meets Eliza Schuyler for the first time, it's at a costume ball. He's wearing a green velvet coat and one of Lafayette's shirts. It hangs down far too long over his legs, but Lafayette can be very convincing when he wants to be, and for all that he feels ridiculous, Alexander is very aware that there have been more than a few admiring looks sent his way this evening, so the advice can't have been all bad. Still, as he allows the woman – clad, he suspects, in a costume that's somewhat too obvious for her taste - he's recently discovered to be Angelica Schuyler to lead him across the dancefloor, he can't help but wish he'd gone for something more... sophisticated. Less ridiculous. The feeling only intensifies when she stops in front of another young woman, who shares with her the same dark eyes and gentle laugh lines at her mouth.

“Elizabeth Schuyler,” she says, and smiles so brilliantly it almost hurts to look at her. Angelica nudges him with her hip.

“Alexander, this is my sister Eliza. Eliza, this is Alexander,” she says. “He was looking very lost and so I thought _we_ could keep him company until his friends arrive.”

“A kindness,” Alexander says, in what he hopes is a gallant tone. Eliza smiles and nods.

“Are they all comings as...” she breaks off, studying the costume, “elves?”

“I hope so,” Alexander tells her, earnestly, “because I will murder every single one of them if they don't.”

Angelica laughs, disentangling her arm from around Alexander's waist. He fights back a moue of dismay. “I leave the details to you, Eliza,” she says to her sister. “I believe I just saw Thomas and I must go say hello.” She disappears in a waft of perfume and a slight collision of an angel wing with somebody else's champagne glass. Eliza watches her leave, then turns back to Alexander.

“My sister is not as subtle as she likes to think,” Eliza says.

“Subtlety is an overrated art form.” A waiter passes, and Alexander delicately retrieves two wine glasses. Eliza hesitates only a moment before she takes one. “If the goal was to get us to talk to each other, it has been achieved, and it would be rude of me to complain about the method when the outcome is so much worth the effort.”

“That's pretty,” Eliza says. “Long-winded, but pretty.”

“And true.”

She shrugs and takes a sip of her drink. There is a careful pause before she speaks again; it feels like an eternity.

“I read your blog,” she says at last. “You write well.”

“In content or in style?”

Her lips purse slightly. “Both,” she tells him. “I don't understand how you can do it every day.”

“I've never understood how I couldn't,” he replies. To his surprise, she nods, thoughtful, considering.

“I suppose,” she says, “that we all have our own gifts to share. I hope that they are reading you back on Earth.”

He doesn't tell her what the statistics are, though he checks on them every day. The last few posts he has made have exploded, are being shared and shared around the colony, around every station from here to everywhere. He doesn't tell her about the calls he receives threatening to shut him down. He especially doesn't tell her that they become explicit, personal, terrifying. 

“I know that they are,” he says instead.

“There's a lot of good you can do with well chosen words,” Eliza tells him.

He takes her hand.

 

 


	4. Yesterday - '81

There is still glass on the floor. Alexander picks his way carefully between the fallen ruins of his old room. Not far behind him, Laurens whistles through his teeth, as the pair of them survey the damage.

“It looks like a bomb went off here, right?” It's a bad joke, with the smell of burning plastic still lingering in the air, but one corner of Laurens' mouth quirks up, the effect only slightly marred by the dark, purpling bruise that continues down one side of his face. A memory, black and charred, stirs at the edges of Alexander's mind and he shakes it away, turns instead to the corner of the room where his desk has fallen on its side, tilting violently against the bedframe. One drawer hangs out, open, any contents it might once have had long since looted. Alexander swears under his breath; there was work there, work he needs. It's the reason he's come back to this place at all. Though he's spent the better part of the year in this small room, it means little to him, a place simply to exist and work, in the times he isn't fighting.

Home, home is where Eliza is, where Angelica is, on the other side of the planet. It feels like a lifetime since he was there, though the rational part of his mind tells him that it has only been a few months. The last time they had spoken, Eliza had held up Philip to the camera, introduced father and son for the first time, and as he had looked into those large, perfect eyes, he had sworn then that he would never let this war touch either of them. He carries that image with him wherever he goes now, when pistol blasts shoot past him, he thinks about the books he will read to the child when he got home, when he emerges into another morning, eyes heavy from the sleep that has not come at all, he imagines the songs he will sing so that his son might never know a night like it.

Silently, Laurens takes his hand and squeezes gently; the touch frees Alexander from his thoughts. “Honestly, I can hardly see the difference,” he says, tone far lighter than his expression. “It's slightly _dustier_ , maybe...”

“You're an ass,” Alexander tells him. “Come on, let's see what we can find, then call it a day.”

He makes a perfunctory search through the desk for anything that might have survived, either the blasts or the blasters, whilst Laurens sets about dragging out the boxes he can find underneath Alexander's ruined bed. There's not much to find, and what there is, Alexander can't bring himself to care about.

He dismisses clothing, books, music; the two suitcases they brought with them are barely full when he calls out the end. As he turns to Laurens to tell him so, he catches a glimpse of quick fingers hurriedly stuffing something in a back pocket. Part of his mind warns him not to ask.

He's never been good at listening to that part.

Laurens turns red.

“It's nothing,” he says. “You already threw it out. I just… rescued it.”

“You have a hero complex,” Alexander says. “Come on, what?”

Without looking at him, Laurens draws the small object out into the light. It glitters in his hand as he holds it up, and Alexander's heart swells with affection when he recognises it.

“I don't remember tossing that aside,” he says, “It must have been by accident.”

“Finders keepers,” Laurens says quickly, and pushes the pen back into his pocket. “Let's go home.”

 


	5. Yesterday - The Wedding

The air smells of roses and new life; the street is strewn with fresh flowers. The colony is young enough, conflicted enough, that they haven't seen many weddings taking place, not since the early days, when it was still fashionable to find a spouse amongst the initial adventurous souls who had volunteered to leave everything they knew behind.

Though Eliza's family aren't all able to attend, there are great screens erected in the square, broadcasting the whole ceremony back and forth, and Alexander finds himself making smalltalk with people he doesn't know far across the solar system. They had asked, the Schuylers, who it was that he wanted to broadcast to, back on Earth. Nobody, he had replied. He glances across the mass of people milling around the reception to where Laurens – hair still unkempt from his last-minute arrival - is sitting, gesticulating wildly as he explains some concept to one of Eliza's aunts, to where Mulligan and Lafayette have their heads bowed together, whispering as they the congregation like hawks, to where Burr leans against a corrugated wall, serenely sipping something brightly coloured from a glass. He isn't sure how many other people he needs on this day.

As soon as he is able, he sidles away from the conversation, almost surreptitiously. Burr watches his approach with something akin to amusement spread across features. He raises his glass in greeting, and allows himself to be drawn into an embrace.

“I thought you weren't coming,” Alexander says.

“I almost wasn't,” Burr replies. He holds up a bandaged hand. “There was a tricky situation at the _office_. But here I am.” He looks away, gazing over the crowd of people, lips quirking slightly. “It is good to see something left untouched.”

“I'm not sure we could say that exactly.”

Burr shrugs. “You should take your joy where it comes to you,” he replies. “It's a wedding. Love, beauty, happiness. It is the furthest thing from a battlefield.”

“You haven't had the _joys_ of talking to Uncle Caleb yet. Five minutes and you'll be itching to go back out there.”

“Please don't tell me every person who disagrees with you is an enemy soldier.” Burr sighs. “You're ridiculously opinionated.”

“I prefer to think of it as 'passionately enlightened'.”

“I expect that you would.”

The sound of Eliza's squeals of delight causes both men to turn. Angelica has hold of her sister around her waist and their youngest sister, Peggy has her arms wrapped around Eliza's neck. All three of them turn and twirl themselves around the dance floor, dresses billowing as they dance. It's hard to think of any sight more beautiful. With careful movements, Burr touches his glass against Alexander's own.

“You're a lucky man, Alexander,” he says. There's no mirth in his eyes. “Perhaps one day I'll share in it.”

“Don't sound defeated before you even start, Burr,” Alexander says. Burr shakes his head, pulls his datapad out of his pocket. More deftly than he should be able to with his injury, he calls up a photo of a young woman, arms thrown high over her head as she twirls in the sunrise, sand beneath her feet. The image is not so small that the glint of gold around her finger is hidden.

“You're making assumptions," Burr says.

 


	6. Today

It's over almost as soon as its begun.

His side burns, and he can barely catch his breath. He stares up, and with a start realises that he's on the ground. There's something sticky on him and he tries to brush it away, but there's dust on his fingertips, dust on his shirt, and the stickiness isn't going away. Somebody pushes his hands away, presses something soft hard against his side. Dimly he hears someone yelling, Burr yelling; he can't hear what's being said, he can't see where Burr is, he can't, he can't…

… when he wakes again, he's indoors. He doesn't recognise the room. The ceiling is grey, white, grey, the bed is too soft, too high. Even the air smells wrong. He tries to look around, but he can't quite make his joints follow his instructions. Instead, he settles for simply turning his head. Beside him, machines hum quietly, one blinks with a rapid green light. Every so often, he can hear it beeping faintly. Hospital then. He tries to remember why.

“You're awake!” Angelica. He frowns up at the dark circles under her eyes and the faded trail of salt tears tracking down her face; he raises a hand to stroke it away, but she catches it with her own, brings it to her lips. “Thank God.”

“What happened?” he asks, and is startled by how raw his voice sounds; he tries to wet his lips, but his mouth is dry. Angelica looks away.

“I'm going to call-” she begins, but he cuts her off.

“Please, Angelica.” She looks at him, helplessly, then over to the corner of the room where two people are curled together, across chairs, sleeping. Eliza, Laurens. “I worried you.”

“You were shot, Alexander.” Her cheek rests against the back of his hand. “I thought we were going to lose you.”

“That doesn't make any sense,” he says. “The war's over.”

“They said an anonymous call led them to you,” Angelica says. “Don't you remember anything?”

His memory tickles at him when he reaches for it, shadowed images flickering just too far out of his grasp. He remembers raised voices and ancient upsets, but there's nothing, nothing in his mind or his heart that can recall what happened beyond that. He remembers Burr, eyes bright, angry and afraid all at once. There's a challenge in the image, but whose he isn't quite sure. Something, there's something he's missing, and it eludes him still.

When Angelica repeats her question, he simply shakes his head.

“Whoever it was, they disappeared." She grimaces, swallows hard like she's trying her best not to cry. He's not sure he's ever seen her this vulnerable before, and his heart aches.

It still doesn't make any sense. He tries to tell her so, but his eyes are heavy again, and he feels, rather than sees, when she leaves his side. He can recognise Laurens' voice in low whispers nearby, can smell the spice of Angelica's perfume in her wake, familiar and comforting. Lips press against his forehead, his cheek, and he doesn't know whose they are. It doesn't matter, he thinks, that they are there with him, are always there with him, is enough.

He falls asleep to the sound of Eliza's prayers.


	7. Yesterday - The Wedding

Angelica’s fingers are deft, light as they twine green-grey ribbon in Eliza’s hair; Alexander can barely take his eyes away. He does not see the shared smile between sisters in the mirror, so caught up is he in the flash of red nail against his wife’s dark locks.

“Aren't you supposed to be writing?” Angelica asks.

“Who says he isn't?” Eliza tilts back her head, just enough that Angelica has to step to the side to look down at her without losing hold on the ribbon. “Alexander has a mental dictaphone. Stores everything.”

“It's called a memory,” Alexander says loftily.

“John sends him brain training games,” Eliza confides to her sister in a whisper that can barely be described as such. “He says he doesn't do them, but I've seen his datapad.”

“Traitor,” Alexander tells her.

“Where is John, anyway?” Angelica asks. She lifts Eliza's head back up, studies her handiwork, a small humming noise sounding in the back of her throat. It's pitch increases to a satisfied _hm_  when she decides she approves. “I thought he would be here by now.”

Alexander shifts uncomfortably on the bed. Both of the sisters turn towards him.

“Alexander?” they say together; the harmonic cadence in the word would make a lesser man's mind short-circuit, he thinks. But when his mouth opens to reply and no words are forthcoming, he makes a mental note to revise his own estimation of his ability to withstand the scrutiny of a Schuyler sister, particularly in duplicate. A small part of him gives thanks that Peggy's supervising preparations elsewhere.

“I'm not sure he's coming,” he says at last. "Family reasons."

Eliza's eyebrow raises. His tongue flickers out to wet his lips; her eyes are dark, studying him like he's one of his own logic puzzles. He daren't look over to Angelica at all. There is silence for a few moments.

“Ours or his?” Angelica asks at last and Alexander can't do anything but shrug and look vaguely guilty. "He thinks the family might find it awkward?" Eliza's face clears with realisation, then clouds over again. She raises a hand to her lips, eyes wide. “Oh, why didn't I think of that. _John_.”

Alexander is staring very hard at the opposite wall. He can see the bristle hair of a paintbrush still left in the egg-blue that Eliza hates so much. His fingers itch to scratch it out.

“I'm calling him,” Eliza says, tone decisive. “Alexander, hand me the phone.” Her cheeks are deep red. Alexander counts the digits as she types. “He's a bigger loser than you are when it comes to feelings. _He's_ family.”

The room is too hot all of a sudden and he's not sure what's happening right now, but what he's certain of is that he isn't able to move. The bed creaks as Angelica flings herself down next to him. Rolling onto her back, she lets her head come to rest on his thigh, and curls her arm around his back. Through his suit, he can feel the back of her hand rubbing small circles over his lower spine, and he can't help but reach out for her. The movement stops as she wraps her fingers over his.

"You're an idiot, idiot," says Eliza when Laurens picks up. 


	8. Yesterday - '81

Laurens is cross-legged on Alexander’s floor, head resting against the rise of his bunk. His hair splays out behind him, as he holds the sheaf of papers high, lips moving as he scans the pages. The hand closest to Alexander is on the floor, two fingers hovering over the curve of his foot. They press down hard when the jiggling of Alexander’s leg becomes severe.

“Well,” Alexander demands, “are you going to say anything?”

“Have a heart, I only started reading half an hour ago and you’ve written the new _War and Peace_.”

“’ _And Peace_ ’, I’d hope”, Alexander says.

“Also, you have terrible handwriting,” Laurens replies, in a tone which matches the high arch of his eyebrow. “You're the only person I know who still writes on paper.”

“It's satisfying,” Alexander says. “It helps me keep my thoughts in order.”

“You spell better,” Laurens agrees. “Which helps.” He returns to reading, hand still resting on Alexander's foot. It doesn't leave Alexander in the most comfortable position, but Laurens' hand is as warm as the room is cold, and he's too wrapped up in mapping the details of Laurens' face as he reads. He wonders if he knows what he looks like when he's caught up in something. There's a distracted calmness to his features when engrossed which doesn't even appear when he sleeps. The thin scar that breaks the dappling of freckles across his face only enhances the effect, punctuating gentle perfection with underlying ferocity.

“I can feel you looking at me,” Laurens says, mildly. “You might want to find yourself something to do.”

Alexander shifts his weight and grins. Laurens' head rolls backwards onto the mattress as he affects a frown, the expression only slightly ruined by the fond smile that he's trying very hard to suppress. “I meant perhaps something that wouldn't take my attention away from your work.”

“Read it tomorrow,” he says. “I've got an early meeting, I won't be around to distract you.”

“By tomorrow you'll probably have written thirty new pages, I'll take my chances now.” Very deliberately, Laurens looks down at the paper again. His hair curls delicately over the back of his neck, and Alexander doesn't resist the urge to kiss it, gentle, huffing warm breaths of laughter when Laurens growls low in his throat.

“Alexander,” he warns.

Alexander kisses him again. One hand traces a line around from the back of his neck, slipping softly into the open collar of his shirt. Laurens groans, pointedly.

“You're not being helpful,” he says. 

Alexander shrugs. “Not trying.” 

Only Laurens, he thinks, would be so careful in placing the papers down; they land in a neat pile even as the man is turning full-circle, shifting to bring his lips to Alexander's. He kisses like he does everything else, with full-hearted intent. His whole body curls forward and he rises to his knees as Alexander lies backwards on the bed, lets the weight of himself press Alexander into the bed.

“That can't be comfortable,” Alexander murmurs against his lips. “Come up here.”

The hard mattress dips only slightly as Laurens complies, presses his whole body alongside Alexander's. He rolls forward until he is sprawled across the other man. Sometimes Alexander thinks, he could spend the day like this, the two of them curled together, all lazy kisses and whispered affections.

Laurens presses down again, and Alexander decides to stop thinking altogether.

When Alexander wakes the next morning, Laurens is still there, snoring softly. He places a kiss on his forehead and scribbles out a note on the back of one of his essay pages. One of Laurens' arms slips from beneath the covers, accompanied by a sleepy noise of disgust at finding himself in the bed alone. Alexander pauses for a moment, picks up the pen again.

“I love you,” he writes on the back of Laurens' arm.

The door clicks closed.

 


	9. Yesterday - '80

The hall has never looked more festive. The hall has never looked festive. Alexander prods experimentally at a bit of tinsel thats wound tightly around what he knows is actually a very sharp bit of broken metal that hasn't yet been fixed from the last riot. Somewhere in the back of his mind a little voice is pointing out that tinsel is flammable and that the twisted panel isn't entirely a reasonable distance from the generators. Still, it's pretty.

There are too many people at this party for his comfort. He's never quite been at ease in a crowd. Before a crowd, yes, but there's a dance happening here, with rules and graces he's never been able to figure out instinctively. He scans the community, hoping that his face isn't displaying exactly how desperate he is to find his friends. It's more difficult than it ought to be; everyone in the place is in costume and colour. It's a demanding, deliberate frivolity this party. He glances again at the sharp, decorated metal edge, and beyond that, through the hole someone hasn't patched up well, to the ground outside and the corrugated walls of the next building over. Reaching out, he smooths a piece of gold foil back over the space.

“Do you have a problem with the decoration?” An unfamiliar voice interrupts his actions, and he turns towards a wide smile that flashes with merriment. “Or are you simply tired of the view?” The woman stands close to him, close enough that the long feathers from the wings she's wearing are starting to curl around his shoulders.

“I'd say something about never being tired with the view, but I think you'd only find me shallow and unworthy of your attention. Which would be a tragedy.”

“Oh, it's all right,” the woman assures him. “I still might, you never know.”

“Alexander Hamilton,” he says and offers his hand.

“I know that,” she says as she takes it. “I've seen you around.”

“I've never seen you.”

“I'm not particularly striking,” she says, then laughs at his incredulous expression. “That's a very good face, don't worry, I was lying. My name's Angelica.” She points at the halo atop her head, as if to punctuate the point. “Schuyler. I've not been here long.”

“Schuyler, as in Schuyler Enterprises?”

“Schuyler as in, you know that it is.” Her wings are tucked firmly behind his shoulder now, and her bare arm is pressed against his; he can feel the warmth of her body through the thin fabric of his shirt. His gaze follows hers around the room, and as he catches every glance, every sideways look that's flung their way, he can feel a familiar tenseness in the way she's holding herself. He wonders if she's here alone, then dismisses the thought. Even if she were, she would never be allowed to remain so for long.

“I think everyone knows that it is,” he remarks, voice low. “Did you ever wish that it was not?”

Angelica laughs; it's not yet free, but as she turns her body towards his, as warm brown eyes meet his own again, he can already feel the rest of the party melting away.

“Rarely,” she says, in a conspiratorial whisper. “I have never been one to throw away my opportunities.”

 


	10. Yesterday - '76

It is far too late when they leave the bar. Laurens and Lafayette wander off in one direction, somewhat too entwined to be entirely steady on their feet. Mulligan is nowhere to be found, and if that's something Alexander still struggles with, _not knowing_ , what he does know is that Mulligan can always be trusted to turn up again and usually with a story that from any other man would sound like an embellishment.

Faint singing can be heard from the direction Laurens and Lafayette have gone, but when he turns to join them, they are already disappeared around the corner. Without quite realising he's doing it until it is done, Alexander sighs.

“Left with me.” It's hard to tell from Burr's tone whether he's offended, disappointed, both or neither. Alexander looks up at him.

“You're a true friend, Burr,” he says, nodding emphatically to prove his point. Burr merely shakes his head, wraps a jacket around his shoulders.

“It's mine,” he says to the unanswered question. “You're already wearing yours and you're shivering.”

It's always too cold between buildings here. Alexander wonders how, with all the technology they've developed to subsist out here, the delicate systems for power, for transport, for hydroponics, that they can't yet seem to make a system that heats these small paths between dwellings adequately.

“Coats were invented already,” Burr remarks when he voices this opinion. “They're state-of-the-art.”

Alexander's nose wrinkles, and he buries himself further into his collar.

“Cute,” Burr says. “Let me get you home.”

Burr's pace is steady, much steadier than Alexander feels, as they walk, and their quarters, almost neighbouring, are not far away. Nothing's far away in this place, Alexander thinks, except for the settlements. He leans on Burr's arm.

“I'm not sure what's heavier,” Burr remarks, “your thoughts or-”

“My entire bodyweight on your right arm?”

“That's the one.”

“I'm light as a feather, Burr.”

“You're a liar is what you are.”

Alexander straightens instantly, hears Burr's sharp intake of breath. “I was joking,” Burr says quickly. He's still holding tight to Alexander's elbow, even through two jackets, Alexander can feel the urgent pressure of it.

“I don't lie.”

“I know that, I was just-” Burr stops, looks down at Alexander. His expression is impassive, deliberately so. When he speaks again, his tone is measured, considered. “Can you really say you don't mislead?”

“Not when it's important.” Part of Alexander wants to step away, but he doesn't think he can move. It's not, perhaps, entirely the alcohol.

“When it's about you, you do.”

“Not when it's important,” Alexander repeats. A flicker of challenge passes over Burr's face, but he doesn't speak. He pulls Alexander in again, hand sliding down from his elbow to grip soft and sure against his wrist, pulls him close enough that Alexander can feel warm breath against his cheek. “Besides,” he adds, “how am I to take honesty lessons from a man who doesn't commit an opinion until he is pushed for it?”

Burr sighs.

“One day,” he says, “you will learn the difference between reticence and deception.”

His fingers tangle with Alexander's, as tightly as a promise. “Now, Alexander. Home.”

 


End file.
